[Pipet Devel] Piper progress

[Jarl van Katwijk]

> What are some of your quick thoughts on "pluggability" on the BL level?
> Recall that the Narval guys wanted to plug their system in as an AI layer.

In the current BL (the one currently in Piper cvs) there are 2 plugin
API's:
1- communication plugins, like the DL and PL, both are linked to the BL
by this api
2- controller plugins, like the admin GUI bundled but not very well
working anymore since the migration from GMS.
Both fully working and fully inhabited by bugs.

PS In the rewrite there will be a similair system, only better build and
with extra logic surrounding it.


> And you're talking about plugging other things into the BL.  I would also
> like to see a pluggable interface that would allow users to swap Overflow
> for something else, like the SRS application that I sent a link to.
Already possible if you write little wrappers that make some external
code a plugin. I wrote that Baby BL for this: took the PL, and wrapped
it by around 200 lines of code. 


Maybe some more out the BL blackbox: SRS plugged into the BL is a BL
node. And that makes a BL network a set of plugged software.




> Would it be CORBA-based?  Is there much work left to have such an API?
Nope, no corba, the plugins are binaries. Corbatized plugins break too
much: handling communications for corbatized plugins is impossible, and
security is done with too.



> Well, I'm the biggest slacker here.  I hope that will change soon (that I
> become more productive, not that everyone else becomes less ;-)).
You'll get sorry about this promise ;)   Anything on you mind to work on
already?



[kopenhagen - danmark]
I could be 2-3 days around, no preferences about the date. Maybe 1 day
before or after the actual BOSC?

jarl